


Free Fall

by syredronning



Series: Draws [13]
Category: Star Trek (2009), Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Dark Agenda, Disability, F/M, Foursome - F/M/M/M, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Violence, complex psychology
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-22
Updated: 2012-04-22
Packaged: 2017-11-04 03:39:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/389336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/syredronning/pseuds/syredronning
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris comes home. But things are not as easy as they all had hoped for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Free Fall

**Author's Note:**

> This is the direct sequel to "Morning Sun", and heavily references characters and situations from "Morning Sun" and "Shadowplay" (Draws XI). 
> 
> Thanks for her continuous support, wonderful beta, and helpful comments go to shagungu. All remaining flaws are solely mine.

The living room is flooded with light as the sun slowly arcs from midday to afternoon position. The house is deadly silent, except for the rhythmic, soothing background noise coming from the sea and a light snoring from Leonard who's dozed off on the couch, sleep-slackened limbs sprawled in all directions. It can't be very comfortable.

Chris looks at the only clock in the house, the one he'd ignored for the longest time. About one hour until the suitcases that are lined up in the corridor are collected. Two hours until their departure. Everything packed, everything done.

Yesterday, he wanted to leave for home. He still wants to; he's just not sure he's ready for the challenge yet. 

With measured steps, he walks through the house once more. In the bathroom, there's the faint sound of water dripping.

_Plop._

_Plop._

_Plop.  
_  
He closes the faucet firmly. 

He walks out onto the veranda, down onto the sand. Takes off his sandals, walks barefoot to the shore. Forces his hands to uncurl and hang loosely, straightens his shoulders out of their sudden tense hunch. Counts his steps, measures his breaths, takes in the smell, blinks at the sky. It's blue and tastes of metal. The rare flash of synesthesia passes as quickly as it comes, and as usual he's not sure whether he should miss that extra dimension of his senses or be glad that all is back to normal.

But what's normal anyway for the cyborg he's become...

He walks to the stone Dael often sat on, takes her place. Imagines her being here — he's not delusional anymore but he's still prone to intense day-dreaming, something the doc doesn't handle too well so he's been hiding it more lately. Wonders what she'd say to him if she saw him now, his hands sweating as he laces his fingers around his knees, curling into a fetal position with his eyes on the sea foam.

 _You could always have asked me to come back here,_ his day-dream says, her eyes dark, large, and unreadable.

He knows, but he wouldn't have done that, not again. It's now up to him to return to the world and live, with them, somehow. His mind blanks as it hits the wall of possibilities, intimidated and overwhelmed. 

"You're okay?" The warm hand on his shoulder jerks Chris out of his funk, and he unlaces his hands, stretching into stand. 

"Yes," he says as he straightens his trembling legs, but his lie shatters under Iro's knowing gaze. "Not really, but I'll manage," Chris concedes. 

"I know you will," Iro says, gently nudging his arm before pulling away. They've become friends over the last weeks, but there's nothing physical or erotic between them, which feels almost strange to Chris who's gotten so used to the sexual undercurrent he has with many of his friends. "Got a call from George, Ashaire arrived safely at the farm."

Chris nods. "Harms sent me a note. He seems to have been a little irritated by George." 

George, Iro's slave, obedient servant, housekeeper, master organizer and officially married better half, had insisted on accompanying Ashaire, probably to see the stallion leave Iro's life for good after having had a certain love-hate relationship with the animal. Usually dressed in deceptively shabby clothes, which are in stark contrast to the aura of wealth around him, it's no surprise that Harms didn't quite know what to make of that short-spoken man. 

Iro smirks but doesn't comment any further. His eyes stray up to the house.

"Where's Leonard?"

"Dozed off. Didn't sleep a lot last night." Neither of them did, actually, as Chris' usual tendency to sleep seems to have been eaten away by the nervous anticipation that had filled him over the last day.

"I've got a meeting at the airport. I could drive you there."

Chris hesitates. 

"I'd be happy to do that for you." 

"Then — thanks, yes, that would be great."

They walk up to the house. 

"I've sent you my private contact information," Iro says as Chris stops to pick up his sandals, brushing the sand off his feet with one hand before slipping into them. "If you ever feel like working for my company…" He leaves the statement open; he'd already made his offer yesterday. While the fact itself, the feeling of being wanted by the owner of IXOS for his knowledge and experience, fills Chris' stomach with warmth, he's not ready to make any decisions about his future.

"Thanks." He casts a last glance at the sea, then walks up the veranda, his steps sounding more determined than he feels. Inside, Leonard is still asleep. Chris offers Iro a cup of tea, and they sit down, waiting in silence. 

There's the comfortable silence he has with Dael and the often intense silence he has with the doc; with Iro, there's that _loud_ silence in which he can almost hear the other man thinking, all those little wheels that never stop turning round, round, round, looking for opportunities. And it's worse than usual because it's the first time Iro has ever entered their house, and his eyes wander through the room, examining every one of the few remaining items, weighing its meaning, worth and price. 

"Nice paintings," he says with a nod to the three beach paintings that decorate the wall of the living room.

"They're Dael's." Chris looks at them in slight shock. How could he forget about them? Possibly because they fit so extraordinarily well into this house, seamless and perfect. 

He gets up and takes them down. There's nothing left to wrap them in, so he places them against the door in the hope the baggage service will be able to secure them for transport.

"Could I have one?" Iro asks as he turns back to him.

"Why would you want it?" Chris asks back, confused.

"As a souvenir, maybe?"

"You never struck me as a sentimental man."

"Then an investment maybe. One day, her works might be expensive."

Chris looks at the paintings. They're special to him, because they're the first ones Dael ever freely offered, but that's personal. Without that bias, they are nothing but beach studies, normal and conventional. Good technique, but without a real soul. "They aren't mine, so it's not within my power to give them away," he says at last. 

"Hmm, what?" Leonard grunts from the couch, forcing his eyes open with a large yawn, barely covered by one loose fist. He freezes as he sees Iro, then sits up in a sudden rush.

"All fine." Chris soothingly pats his lover's shoulder. It's almost funny how the doc never really got over his knee-jerk reaction to Iro, a mixture of instinctive defense and subdued jealousy, no matter that Iro and George turned out to be the most monogamous couple Chris has met in a long time. "He only wants to give us a ride to the airport."

"Okay." Leonard gets up from the couch. "Damn, I'm thirsty." His eyes trained on Iro, he picks up Chris' cup and drains it down, putting an awful lot of claim into that small gesture. 

Chris wonders how it'll be back home, with Leonard and Dael within the same walls.

The doorbell rings, announcing the pickup service for their suitcases. 

***

They could've beamed, the doc offered as much, but Chris had preferred to take the shuttle.

Now that they're up in the air, he sorely regrets it. 

Voices in wild chaos _, I'm hungry, mom, I hate flying, can I please have a sandwich,_ the sickening smell of luke-warm cheese _, fasten your seatbelts, are you okay?  
_  
"Are you okay?" Leonard repeats. 

Chris nods, despite the harsh, coppery taste on his tongue that doesn't go away over the sip of coffee he hastily takes. 

Leonard's fingers drape over his wrist, for comfort and to check his state. On a small tricorder, there are lights blinking.

Sometimes Chris hates the _doctor_ aspect, the never-ending examination that makes him feel like some lab rat. 

A tiny hiss, and he feels his head clearing. 

"Better?" Leonard asks quietly, stowing the hypo away.

"Yes, thanks." Chris leans against him, brushing his lips against his lover's cheek. He might hate those stealthy checkups, but he can still be grateful.

"Just another hour," Leonard says.

If suffering had units, time spent with that many people around Chris is the currency. 

They really should've beamed.

"Tell me more about the implant." Chris raps at the back of his head with his forefinger.

"The implant? Of all the times you could've asked me, you do it here?" the doc grumbles.

Until now, Chris has pointedly pushed aside any further thoughts about that thing in his head, but now that they're on their way back, he'd like to be somewhat informed. 

"Distract me. Occupy me." 

Leonard shakes his head but pulls out a PADD anyway. He calls up images and schematics, then gives it over to Chris. 

Looking at it like that, the implant is a filigree beauty, technology of the next century. Chris as its carrier is a precious specimen: only the third to receive one, he's a medical miracle and if he keeps losing track of what he does and where he is at times, it's an ignorable, tiny aberration.

There's awe in the doc's voice when he talks about the neural pathways the implant spans, the way it helps regulate brain chemistry to the picogram, such a delicate balance.

"And if it fails?" Chris asks. 

"You know the deal," Leonard replies steadily, but avoids his eyes for a moment.

The deal is a hard, unyielding table on which he's tied down to be put into the neural stabilizer. If they're fast enough to get him there at all.

"Any idea how long it will work?" How long he might have in this next iteration of his existence. "How long, doc?"

"Not sure. The lead developers hope for at least five years before we might substitute for it a newer version that should last twice as long. So no need to think you'll die tomorrow."

"Five years is good," Chris says and gives back the PADD. Leonard opens his mouth to say something but he's lost interest. Five is a good number, he can work with that. "Going to the restroom, be right back." He gets up, sees Leonard's impulse to go with him. "I'm fine, thanks."

And he is, quite. He'd never be as mobile as in the past, but he can walk, imagines walking on sand, seeing the sun, Ashaire in the distance. For a second, he smells the beach, then the vision vanishes and is substituted by a crying child and its frustrated caretaker.

He spends ten of the last twenty minutes of the flight sitting on the closed toilet seat, staring holes into the locked door.

***

The ride in the lift has never felt so long. The trembling starts in his legs, then sneaks upwards and into his hands. He grabs a hold of the handrail, leveling his breathing.

"It'll be okay," Leonard says overly cheerfully. "They're looking forward to seeing us. We'll be fine." He takes Chris' other hand.

Chris nods mutely. 

The lift comes to a strangely abrupt halt, and he tumbles against the wall. "I'm fine," he says roughly as the doc wants to steady him, pulling away from the supportive grip and walking out into the corridor instead. 

_RING._

_RING.  
_  
Has the doorbell always been that loud?

The door opens. His legs are lead, unable to move. 

Leonard walks forward, hugs Jim, waves back at him. That at last breaks the spell, compels him forward too into the arms of his younger lover, the man he'd caused so much trouble for. Sorrow and regret run into their embrace, his apologies accepted not so much in words, but in the strength of Jim's arms around him.

And then there's Dael. The next minutes are a blur until he finds himself in his bed with Dael's face protectively hovering above him. 

He drags her close, pressing his face against her neck. "I feared…"

"I did too."

"Missed you." He puts kisses on her throat. 

"Missed you too." She sighs. 

For a while, they're just caressing each other, enjoying the closeness they'd missed for the last weeks. 

"You feel good," he says after a while. "Soft." 

She chuckles about his wording.

"Has Jim been good to you?"

Dael shifts so that she can face him fully, and puts one spread palm on his cheek, her thumb drawing a line on his bottom lip. "Yes."

He brushes down her body, along her ribcage, over her hips. She feels softer, less bony. "Did you gain some weight?"

"A bit. But maybe I'm just relaxed." Her gaze travels along his eyebrows with a gentle smile. "I introduced him to Arissa's family. We've been out a lot."

"Oh." It's unexpected news, and Chris doesn't quite know what to do with it.

"We had a lot of fun." Dael's fingers suggestively glide over his pants. Almost automatically, he rolls his hips forward and pushes against her pelvis, and she readily answers his move. He curls, kissing down her tiny breasts.

"Did you have a good time with Leonard?" she asks after a few more minutes, her hands laced into his hair. 

He scrambles for an answer. "Yes. He cared for me… sometimes too much. Always the doctor… but it was good." He sighs against her chest, unwilling to go into details that might be more than she'd like to know. "A strange kind of wonderland, that beach. Real and still…" 

They stop talking again as she strips him, then gets rid of her own shirt and pants. 

"Let me…" she whispers and crouches over him, one hand tightly around his half-hard erection. "At times I wondered whether I just couldn't turn you on anymore. But that's not true, is it?" She strokes him gently.

"Oh, no," Chris says impulsively, reaching out to touch her hand to underline his words. "Just didn't feel sexual at all for quite a while but that had nothing to do with you."

"Good." She smiles at him, then without ado lowers her head to take him in. There's no hesitation anymore, no need for some taste-changing lube, and he arches in aroused surprise. 

"You don't have to…"

He shuts up as her grip on his hip tightens. There's a tiny bit of teeth in the mix, a playful bite that tells him to stop being silly and to enjoy the ride instead. 

She'd been good at giving head in the past but she's fucking great now, going deep with her lips tight around his shaft. One hand cradles his balls, her tongue teasing his glans, and soon his sack tightens, drawing in as an early sign of his impeding orgasm. Quite a feast, considering that the doc and he had made the most of their last days together.

"Stop, please," he croaks out, nudging the back of her head. She slowly lets his cock slip out of her mouth, making him groan with a last lick. "Want to ride you. If that's okay." 

Visibly excited by his suggestion, she eagerly jumps over him to the side, grabbing two bottles of Jim's special brand. "Cherry or almond?"

He gets up on one elbow. "What happened to vanilla?" 

"Arissa got sick of it," she says matter-of-factly, but looks the other way anyway for a moment. 

_Her_ again. Chris isn't sure when exactly Arissa had become such an influence in his household, wonders if that happened at that first moment when he'd recommended Dael to her for the bar job, and then every event along the way, like organizing that joint party, had just been another piece to strengthen that base. Somehow, their four nodes have become the core of a network that gets more and more complicated, like a heart of transparent aluminum that glitters in the laser light, bright and beautiful. 

"Christopher?" She gently touches him. 

He shoves the images aside. "Almond it is, then." He sits up as she gives the bottle to him and positions herself on the bed on all fours.

"Missed that," he whispers as he kneels down behind her, reverently running his hands over her tattooed back and down her legs before lubing up his left hand and working it into her. 

Her ass… she's not that tight anymore.

The thought takes a moment to settle, his mind unwilling to accept what his fingers report. His arm slows down, his fingers slipping out as gravity seems to double.

"Anything wrong?" She tilts her head back right in the second that realization hits her, and her eyes widen, a flash of guilt in them.

"Anything you'd like to tell me?" he asks numbly. It's stupid to feel so strongly about the idea that anyone else has her like that, fucks her boyish ass — she's not his property, after all. But Jim had asked, had positively _pushed_ for some limit, and this had been the only thing Chris had ever wanted for himself. It makes him feel so insecure all of a sudden, wondering if he's really still wanted here.

She lowers her forehead onto her folded arms, a gesture of defeat. 

"Jim?" He slowly pushes in with two fingers. 

She nods mutely. 

"Did he ask for it?"

"No." Dael shifts, looking back at him over her shoulder. "I wanted it." She sighs. "I only had sex once during my mission, and then I stayed with you and you know we never really… I would have wanted to have it with you but that didn't happen and Jim was there and…" She rises on her arms. "I'm sorry," she says flatly. 

His hand on her hip keeps her from drawing away. "Stay," he says hastily. "Please. Dael. It's okay. Stay." He puts a kiss on her tailbone, repeating his words, his acceptance. Of course, they didn't have sex really which must've left her absolutely starved, and he'd be such a hypocrite to ask her to abstain from things he introduced her to, while he fucked around with the doc. "I'm sorry I asked."

"No, I should've told you," she mutters, her head down on her arms again.

His fingers explore the new freedom. "So… just Jim?"

"Only Jim and Arissa. Though she never fucks my ass with a dildo… just with her fingers… oh…" 

A flicker of annoyance before it's washed away by the beautiful noises Dael makes. She's become more responsive, Chris thinks as he watches her melt into his touch. He's using his thumbs alternately, his preferred way to open up someone, and she whimpers and wiggles, asking for more. 

"Do you like her fingers?"

She chuckles. "I like fingers that know what to do. Like yours too… oh…yes." Her hips gyrate back to him, and she suddenly arches, groaning in what sounds suspiciously like…

Stilling his fingers he laughs, surprised and exhilarated. "You can come on fingers in your ass?" Bending forward, he puts some more kisses on her back. "Oh wow, guess I missed something. You're fantastic. Love you, darling."

"Love you too," she says breathlessly. "Fuck me, Christopher. Like you did in the past."

He's not sure he's quite up to their old pacing, can imagine Jim being a lot more energetic than he could summon, but then he once again shoves his insecurity aside. She wants him, not just for this but _also_ for this and he'll do his best. It's not as if the doc complained over the last weeks, either. Sex has turned out to be one of the few actions in which he's completely sure of what is real, that grounds and centers him amidst his so often jumbled thoughts, and there's no need to let doubt ruin this now, not when everything's looking up. Not when his beautiful boy-girl is waiting to get fucked by him, all ready and needy.

For a moment, he fists his erection, still one thumb in her ass, then gets up on his knees and pushes in. 

*** 

Afterwards, exhaustion hits him like a solid wall, psychic, physical, he doesn't know, but he sinks into the mattress and Dael just keeps touching him gently and carefully. _"I'll take care of you. You're safe. Just sleep."_

He's in the comfortable twilight zone between dream and reality when the bed moves and a kiss meets his lips. 

"Just going for a shower," the words flow, but then the steps leave the room out into the corridor instead. He stops wondering, goes back to sleep until the sound of the water shower indeed reaches his ears. It's soothing, calming. It's also motivating him to leave the bed at last, slightly unsteady legs finding strength when his naked feet meet the ground. He pads into the bathroom just as she stops the water and pulls away the curtain to reach for a towel. He gives it to her. 

She smiles at him. 

She really smiles a lot more than in the past, the thought solidifies. Suddenly unbelievably needy for her, he reaches out and caresses her face. Bowing into his touch like a willow, Dael closes her eyes. 

"Get out," he whispers, and with a curious gaze she steps onto the floor, a trail of drops in her wake. He takes the towel from her fingers, then moves her against the wall. The floor is hard under his knees, but her body is soft and humid, her hips curving against his lips that search her sweet spot. She tastes of shower gel and nothing else, and that he even thinks of that tells him that he hasn't come much farther to adjusting to her female scent, but that doesn't matter right now. His tongue runs down her slightly spread folds, teasingly nudging along their length, and she laughs breathlessly, her hands stroking through his hair. 

She comes quickly and so hard that she sinks down next to him, flat on her back with knees folded, one arm over her eyes, one hand finding his. He dries his face on her towel. 

"Thank you," she mutters. "That was great."

He can't keep his hands from her, running his fingers along her tattooed chest, her white arms and thighs. For a while there's just comfortable silence, until she sits up and curls her arm around her knees, looking at him serenely.

"What do you see in me? Why do you still want me?"

 _Why didn't you stay with Leonard?  
_  
A good question, one he'd turned over in his head at various times during the last weeks. 

His fingers find hers once more, in a gentle hold. "I don't know if I can really explain it. I love you. That's the bottom of it. I want you, for company, for sex, for everything you want to give me." Chris smiles at her. 

It's been a good start, judging from the way her features brighten a bit, but obviously not enough to dispel her wondering. "But there have to be things you don't find with others. Something special."

"True." And she should know those, but it seems she needs to hear them put into words. "With you, I found a common base. I'm not sure why that is, but with you I have a place to… just be. Rest my weary head, a poet might say. You don't question me all the time, you don't push me for answers. You take me as I am."

"And he doesn't?" 

Chris knows exactly who she means. "No. Not like that. And I need him for that, for the challenge, the pushing, the critical gaze. The way he makes me rethink decisions, forces me to face truths I'd rather not see." 

"And where does Jim fit in?"

Chris can't suppress a sigh. "I don't know. What we once had… it changed, more than with anyone else, and I don't know yet how we fit again. I think he put me on a pedestal way back and then found that I haven't just feet of clay, but mostly _am_ clay, including the potential to ruin the one relationship he can't do without."

"They'll be fine," Dael says soothingly, caressing his fingers. "Like you, Jim had lost his center for a while, but he found it again."

"Thanks to you?" Chris inquires, running his hand down her shoulder.

"I mostly offered him the secure space to explore himself. To feel more alive." She smiles, her gaze drifting off in memories. 

"I'm glad you were here for him."

Her smile deepens. "It wasn’t a sacrifice. He's such a beautiful person. So much energy and love for life. Constantly exploring and learning." Shifting her solemn gaze back at Chris, she tightens her grip on his hand. "But as you said… you and me, we've got a common base, a place of rest, of just being able to be. Without them, we might stagnate, but without each other, we wouldn't be able to bear their strength, their way of challenging us to go outside of our comfort zone."

He nods mutely. She'd said it perfectly, nothing left to add.

"I'm so glad you're here," she says and takes him into an embrace.

***

It's a good thing they're careful when opening the door to the kitchen a while later, dressed in beach clothes they'd picked out of the already delivered suitcases, bright colors and the smell of salt water dancing around them. Their men are inside, kissing like there's no tomorrow, and when they part, it's only for Jim to open his jeans and bend over the table, clean dishes getting shoved aside while Leonard pulls down his own zipper, his expression between hungry and awestruck.

Chris and Dael quietly move away.

"I'm so glad," he mutters, not an ounce of jealousy in his mind, only immense relief that the couple is doing fine. "I was so concerned about them." He follows Dael's lead that brings them to her room.

"I want to show you something." With a wide gesture, she opens the door.

"Impressive," he barely manages, then falls silent. What had once been such a bleak and lifeless room has turned into an explosion of earth colors and soft lines. Like a hiding place — like a strange kind of womb. And so very, very female.

"Come in." She nudges him, and he carefully makes a step inside, as if his entry might desecrate something. 

"Your doing?" he asks and vaguely waves his hand. It's not an intelligent question, but this is so different from anything she's ever shown to him, he needs a moment to wrap his mind around it.

"Yes, mostly mine, with some suggestions by Jim. Come, sit down."

He hesitantly sits down on the bed, crossing his legs, then uncrossing them again and neatly sitting down with his feet on the floor, hands loosely on his thighs. If this room mirrors the changes in Dael, he's got to do quite some catching up. 

She picks something from the desk, then joins him. 

"T.A. sent me a picture."

He looks at her in confusion. "Who?"

"T'Anihl - T'Anihl ch'Retrrln, the Romulan boy I grew up with on Khal'kohachi."

"Oh. I thought you weren't in contact," Chris wonders as he takes it.

Dael shrugs. "Yes and no. Despite his distrust, he keeps exchanging memories of the past with me, and then he sent this."

It's a shot of a painting. There are cornflowers under a strange sky, but unlike the variations on this theme that he's familiar with, this painting is full of life. Broad strokes and delicate details form something larger than a two-dimensional canvas, make the flowers leap from the painting in an explosion of spring.

This painting has all the soul that her new ones are missing, and it hurts him more than his own losses to see hers in such clarity.

"It's gorgeous," he says, throat dry. 

"It was my last on Khol. They took it with them when they escaped, as a memory of me." She takes the photograph in her hand, her focus drawing inwards. "I often painted in Al'Retrrln's studio. It was large, with high ceilings and full of light. He was such a kind man and a great teacher. He treated me as if I were his own daughter. Dad used to joke about it, but… ah well." She sighs. "He was a good artist, but Al'Retrrln was the master." Her mood, so carefree only minutes ago, tangibly shifts. "And I never even tried to find out if they had survived."

"It's not your fault," Chris says as she gets up, picture in hand. "You had other things to deal with."

"Other things, oh yes." With a sad smile, she puts the photograph away.

"Sweetheart…" He reaches out, relieved when she turns back to him and takes his hand. Taking him by surprise, she sinks down on her knees in front of him, barely giving him the time to spread his legs to make room for her. She takes both his hands in a reverent hold.

"I lost my family. Then I threw away what could have been my second family, wrapped up in my pain and… chaos." She pulls his hands up to her forehead, moving back and forth like in a strange prayer. "You are my new family. With you, I feel at home. I can only hope to be worthy of this for a long, long time to come."

He shakes his head, out of words. Here he is, thanking daily the strange fate that had brought her along, and there she is, thinking that she's the one who is blessed by having to deal with his troubles, their joint package of emotional entanglement. "Crazy girl," he finally says, his voice unsteady. "Crazy, wonderful girl. I'm not complete without you." He wants to say more, that he's sorry for trying to push her away again and again, presuming she'd be better off with someone else. That might still be true in the future but not today, not for awhile to come. Not for the next five years, if he's lucky.

"I'm yours," he says and lifts her face with his fingers. Her eyes are bright and beautiful, and he bathes in them while he takes both of them by surprise with his next words. "I'm yours, and I want to tell that to the whole damn world. You and I. Let's make it official. Vows and papers and all."

"Oh," she says and then nothing else for a long moment, before asking, "What about Leonard and Jim?"

"I don't want to change the parameters of our foursome," Chris hastens to say, his arguments as much for her as for himself. "This is about the two of us. They already had their party. Getting married didn't stop them from going after me, and being officially partnered won't stop us from being with them, or other people. But I want to make it known what we mean to each other."

"Yes." She curls over their laced hands. "Yes, Christopher. Yes."

He slides down from the bed to get on one level with her, because in this they are together as _equal_ s. They melt into each other's arms, the world momentarily forgotten. 

***

When they cautiously open the door to the kitchen a while later, their men are seated almost chastely apart with the lasagna and an open bottle of white wine between them, talking about the _Enterprise_. When Chris and Dael walk in, their discussion dies and their men's gazes change, curiosity and concern an inseparable mix.

"We've just made a decision," Chris says giddily, lifting Dael's and his laced hands. "Know, by chance, any captain who could partner us off?"

"Oh whoa!" Jim gets up from his seat with a bright smile. "You're lucky, I know someone with a ship that's ready for a test drive out of the solar system in just six weeks!" He embraces Dael, hugging and kissing her before moving on to Chris. "Congratulations to you. I'm so happy for you. That's great."

Leonard doesn't look as happy, rather has a wistful expression on his face for a moment before he pushes it aside. "Congratulations." he says and gives them both a brief hug, then sits down only to get up a heartbeat later, mumbling something about the restroom. Chris picks up Jim's and Dael's concerned gazes, nodding. He couldn't have held back with the news, not when he feels like his whole world had just gained more colors, but he should've realized it would be a shock for Leonard. 

_There's always someone hurting, sometimes_ , he thinks, his stomach flipping a little. "I'll be right back," he says, leaving Jim and Dael in the kitchen. They'd manage.

He finds the doc in the _Jim &Bones_ room, perched on the edge of the bed with his face in his palms. Chris sits down next to him, not quite touching. "Sorry for coming out with it without any warning. I just… I feel so happy. I'm sorry."

"Stop being silly," Leonard mutters and drags off his hands to frown at Chris. "Don't you _ever_ apologize for being happy. That's what I want for you, even if it's not with me."

"Now you stop being silly," Chris says, slightly irritated. "We had wonderful weeks to ourselves. You mean so much to me. I'm not any less happy about having you in my life, just because we're making this official."

"I know. And I know it's good for Deal, will stop people from thinking she's just the sidekick of a man with a midlife crisis. It just took me by surprise."

"It surprised me too, that I would want that, but it feels - right." Chris pulls him close. "You've got Jim. I've got Dael. And we’ve all got each other. This isn't _less_ of a commitment — it's _more_. To everything we are to each other."

"Yes, I know." Leonard sighs again, hanging his head. "Sorry for acting so stupid."

"At your partnership party, I was happy for you but I _still_ wanted to get into your pants so fucking much. That never changed. You and Jim gave me such a great gift by letting me in. I wouldn't be here today without you."

He can see Leonard swallowing down a remark, probably something along the line of _you wouldn't have had such a clusterfuck without us either_ , but Chris is glad he doesn't say it. No use crying about the past. It's all right, and it is good to look forward from it to a brighter future.

"I love you and I love Dael, and would do anything to make her happy, give her the life she deserves. That's not a contradiction, you know."

"I know. I feel the same about Jim. Love you too, Chris, so much. Goddamn bastard that changed my life," Leonard says choked-up and pulls him into an embrace, kissing him almost harshly before resting his head against Chris' shoulder. 

"One day, we'll all be together," Chris whispers into his lover's ear. 

"Oh, don't you bring up that farm idea," Leonard mutters. "Harebrained, silly fantasy…"

"Ashaire was just the beginning. We'll make that silly fantasy come true, I promise."

Leonard shrugs and pulls away, getting up. "Be careful what you wish for, Chris. Right now, Jim's deeply involved in the _Enterprise_ refit. He's hungry for space and new missions. I don't want to see him tied down on Earth anytime soon."

"I don't want to tie anyone down," Chris says with a frown, rising to his feet too. Was this the same man who during his last stay on Earth had stated his need to get planetside because he couldn't bear Jim being in danger again and again? Seems the doc's opinion has changed quite a bit. 

"But if in some years, it's still what he wants — what _we_ want?" Chris adds questioningly, suddenly wondering if it's ever been Leonard's dream at all and not getting a clear answer from shaded brown eyes — "There will be a place for you to go."

The mouth of his lover curves into a slightly forced smile. "Nothing wrong about the general idea," he says vaguely. "Well, so… how about going back to the kitchen?"

"Yes, sure," Chris says flatly, his overflowing happiness of only minutes ago drained from the discussion and the concerns that raised their ugly heads, the old feelings of helplessness. He feels out of breath, his chest tight and sweat breaking on the back of his neck as he follows the doc into the corridor, his legs sluggish and almost fighting him. Heavily leaning against the wall, he tries to shake off the growing danger of drowning.

"Hey, hey, all fine." Arms fold around him, pulling him into a close embrace. Calming hands run down his back in soothing strokes. "All fine, Chris. Got you." More hands join in, bodies covering his. "We got you. All fine," the chorus repeats, and carries him into safety. When he feels the ground again, he opens his eyes and, strangely, meets Jim's open, unguarded gaze first. 

"We got you," Jim says. "And we won't let you fall." 

*** 

They're four at the kitchen table, and he's flanked by Dael and the doc.

It's so different from the last time they'd all been together, when it had looked like they'd be able to make the foursome work for them all, on everybody's terms. Now they're back to figuring out how the pattern looks, shifting pieces on a table top, exchanging pointless words like tennis balls.

Jim's eyes are even bluer than Chris could remember. "I'm sorry, Jim," he says, because it's been on his mind for so long and because he can't stand the false sense of comfort everyone's trying to create. "So sorry. I never wanted to ruin your life and career, and I almost did."

"It's okay, Chris. I know you didn't exactly plan it," Jim says in a soothing tone.

"I know Leonard is yours. It was never a question. Not really."

"We figured that one out. Don't worry." Jim smiles, taking the hand of his husband.

"I'll make it up to you," Chris says, and looks around. "To all of you. Not that I could ever repay it, really, but I swear I'll make the best of this… new _life_ I've been given by you. I do. I _have_ to." His voice trembles as like a cold breeze, the ghostly fear of past failures runs through him, memories of his incommunicado self, locked away by his own choice and staring out of windows into empty skies. 

"Christopher," Dael says, her slim hand on his forearm, and he breaks out of the momentary terror, takes a deep breath, clears his throat, noticing all too well how they all look at him with various degrees of concern. "Sorry." he says, again, and it's so pointless it makes him want to get up and run away from the table. But there isn't a beach or Ashaire for a ride, it's his apartment and it feels so small right now.

Going forward means staying here, sitting at the table and behaving like a normal human being.

He nods at the others and forces a smile on his face before he picks up the fork, resuming his meal.

***

His bedroom looks so full, with three people sitting on the bed. 

"Come on in," Jim says, waving his hand. 

Chris freezes on the doorstep. 

"You get first pick," Jim adds, not really helpful. "It's your bed, after all."

His bed, his lovers. Three. There's no good choice, he can't pick anything, left, right, middle, if he chooses right it'll be wrong, and the middle has two middles, no good position, he doesn't know, three is such a wrong number, copper taste on his tongue, he can't decide… 

"Told you it's he's not good at choosing between options," Chris can hear Leonard's voice through the loop he's in, but only Dael's touch can break through it.

The couples sleep separately.

***

The city is almost too bright in the sunlight the next morning, and full of people who swarm around him like insects, their strange noises a loose fabric of sentences. He swims in it until a single strand hits him, delivering insults.

He stares after a passing, middle-aged couple. "Were they talking about us?" 

On his side, Jim frowns. "Hmm?" 

"I thought they said something about me and you," Chris says. "You know… bad things." He regrets his words the second they're out, because the doc stops abruptly and turns his head. _Concern_ doesn't even begin to cover what he sees in his lover's eyes.

"Do you often feel like people say bad things about you behind your back?"

"No," Chris says. _Not since my breakdown_. 

"Well, there’s a good chance he's right," Dael says matter-of-factly, her uncovered tattoos sharp on her face on this crystal-clear morning. 

Leonard looks annoyed. "Just because it happens to you doesn't mean it happens to Chris," he says, but already a little unsure.

"I guess I misheard," Chris says. 

"A little paranoia is probably to be expected, considering what happened," Jim says rationally. "Come on, let's go someplace quieter."

"You're not helping things," he can hear the doc mutter to Jim when they move forward. He only starts breathing again when they're in an almost empty shop.

And as he squarely ignores a staring man who he vaguely remembers from the Admiralty, he decides that any whispers he might overhear are just in his imagination. 

***

Home is the place where the silence feels peaceful, and he retreats to the bedroom the second they're back from their outing.

There's a PADD with a list of therapists on the bed, assembled by Leonard. He scrolls through them, but nobody resonates right away. He'd gone through enough therapy after the _Narada_ to have grown wary of it all, because looking back, it hadn't really helped a lot. Chris never mentions Alain aloud but he sometimes wishes someone would offer him some serious intervention now, would take his broken part out. Sometimes, it is necessary to sacrifice something to protect the rest.

He shakes his head about himself. As if his head was a machine… though with the implant, maybe…

For an hour, he unpacks his baggage, touching everything reverently, bathing in the images and feelings that everything evokes, of blue skies and warm sand, of the beach, a place that already starts to feel like Paradise Lost, a parallel world which he should maybe never have left. He ends up cross-legged on the bed with one of her books in his hands. 

Once again, the signs don't speak to him, quiet lines of alien script that will forever withhold their secrets from him. He's starting to resign himself to the fact that his breakdown had cost him all of the Romulan he'd worked so hard for, but that's better than when his subconscious had played tricks with him, making him think he was able to read these poems.

With a sigh, he puts the two books on his nightstand, as a symbol of his complete acceptance of Dael and everything she cares about. 

"I can always read them to you," she whispers in his ear when he drifts into slumber, and her recitation lulls him like a fairy song. 

***

On the next day, the tribe decides to visit the notorious Astaire. Chris is well aware that it's meant as a gift, considering that none of the others care a lot about horses, and he doesn't actually feel like leaving for such a long, probably tiring trip. Not wanting to discourage the others, though, he slips onto the backseat of his car. Dael sits next to him on the left with her right knee comfortably pressing against his, holding his hand.

Leonard's shoulders are tense in front of him.  
 _  
I'm sorry._

_Don't be stupid. I wanted you to be happy, even if it's without me._

The truth of how Dael's answer — despite all promises — had changed so much between them is out in the daylight of this bright morning, and it's like metal scratching over glass in the back of his head. 

Leonard is a possessive, jealous guy. It's one of the things Chris likes about his lover. It's also one of the things he doesn't know how to deal with when facing it head-on. They can't have their cake and eat it, not really, and why the hell can't Leonard adjust to that and let them all have the best possible life together, in the way they can?

Dael's hold on his hand tightens, a gentle reminder to breathe and look somewhere else, like in her eyes. 

Jim drives fast. Behind her, out of the window, the world moves.

The world in his head suddenly moves faster.

"Stop," he says.

"What?" Jim asks, looking at him through the back mirror. 

"Stop. Let me out. Stop!" He jerks at the door but the security mechanism won't release until they stop. Then he tumbles out, bending over the nearby strip of grass with his hands on his knees, his half-digested breakfast painting white strips on the green. 

One light hand touches his shoulder, just enough to let him know he's not alone. Another hand joins in, heavier. 

They never fight over him. Not openly.

"Breathe evenly, in, out, in, out… that's it. You're doing good."

They debate, then turn the car around. 

He can't speak until they're back home, sitting around the kitchen table. "I'm sorry. That never happened before." His hands are still shaking.

"You were on a quiet beach," Leonard says. "You'll get used to being here again." The doc's seated on the other side of the table, next to Jim. Apart.

"We could beam."

"It's not that easy right now, Chris," Jim says, making it sound as if they'd already spoken about it. He can't remember. "You don't have an active 'fleet account and ours are getting low."

"Okay," he says because there's nothing good to say, then gets up and sits out on the balcony, arms laced around his bent knees, watching the sky. 

He'd wanted to be home. He'd been hopeful he'd manage. Now he already feels himself drawing inwards, shutting down. 

Thin arms lace around his shoulders from behind.

"I'm broken," he declares solemnly. "Like that cup I once smashed. Too many pieces to ever fix again." Saying it feels good. The doc always pretends he's not.

"I know how you feel," Dael says quietly, covering his body with her own in a strangely protective gesture. She's gotten so strong; in a way, he doesn't know her at all. 

Human voices dance in the air, alien and meaningless. He feels like he's losing his language again. 

"But there's always a way, Christopher. We'll find a way." She cradles him in an embrace, her hands covering his chest. "Trust me."

***

Thanks to a shot of tranquilizers and assorted other drugs in his blood Chris sleeps for a few hours, waking up refreshed and awake. The doc is there to scan him when he walks out of the shower, and he playfully throws the towel at his lover, reminiscent of their beach vacation. 

"So, how am I?" he asks while getting dressed.

"Your blood values are okay. But you know you need to go to SFM for a full checkup." 

"Next week, okay?" He knows he can't evade the feared visit for all eternity but he wants to push it back for as long as possible. He'd like to be emotionally more stable for it and despite how their day had gone, he's still hopeful that being at home with his cloverleaf would have a positive influence on his development. Once he's settled in.

When he comes out of the bedroom, the atmosphere between the others is a little strained, though. Something's out of tune, and for once it doesn't seem to have to do with him and his volatile state. He manages to keep quiet all through dinner and for another quarter of an hour after they've moved to the living room with cups of coffee, Jim in an armchair, Leonard on his stomach on the cushioned floor, Dael on his side on the couch.

Then he finally breaks the silence. "What's the matter?" 

Three sets of eyes rise from whatever they read on all those damn PADDs. "Dael?"

She unfolds next to him. "Jim and I have an invitation for tonight, for one of Arissa's parties. We said we wouldn't be able to come because of our trip to the countryside but now we're here and we could go." 

"And that's a problem?" Chris asks. "I wouldn't mind you attending." 

She shrugs. _I guessed so_ , it spells out.

"If you want to go, then go. And give my best wishes to Arissa and tell her I'll definitely stock vanilla lube again," he adds lightly. He's not totally relaxed when it comes to that woman but he trusts that Dael would always choose him, strange as the thought is. "Out with you, hush, hush!" He waves at Jim. A smile tugs at Dael's lips, and she leaves, going to get dressed. 

It's the look in Leonard's eyes that tells Chris what — and who — the problem is. But when Jim gets up to follow her, the doc stays quiet. 

"What's the matter?" Chris pushes when Jim is outside. 

"I don't feel comfortable letting them go," Leonard says grudgingly, sitting up. "It just doesn't feel right at the moment. Yeah, tell me I'm silly." 

"Why don't you go with them?"

"We're not going to leave you alone," Leonard says firmly. "I won't leave you alone."

Chris sighs. "This is my apartment. I'll survive a few hours without you all."

There's a tiny shake of Leonard's head, telling him enough. He's not to be trusted to look after himself, not yet, not after today. It rankles more than it should, considering that they're trying to protect him — but he's not some helpless toddler. 

"If you want to go with them, do it for god's sake. Though you realize that they'll act nothing like they would without you, right?"

"I just want to know where they're going… what the place looks like. I wouldn't actually want to watch them anyway," Leonard admits, eyes averted.

"Then move, man, and come back when your curiosity is satiated," he orders. "I'll keep the couch warm for you." He makes a suggestive gesture, running one hand down his groin. They had been great together at the beach. They could surely be here too, if the doc gets his act together. 

"You would?" Leonard's face lightens up.

"Of course. An evening just to ourselves. They have fun the way they prefer, we have fun old-men-style."

"Old men, tsk," the doc grouches but gets up on his feet. "Fine. I'll deliver the kids, take a look, and come back." He leans over for a kiss. "Shouldn't take longer than an hour, max."

"I should be able to survive that." 

"Unproven," the doc murmurs and kisses him again with some tongue, slipping one warm hand around his neck to caress his hairline. It's hot enough to get his dick perking up in interest.

"But maybe you can come back a little faster, just to make sure," he whispers, capturing the doc's hand to put it on his groin.

Leonard chuckles, patting his hardening erection. "I'll do my best."

Thirty minutes later, his tribe is out of the door. 

***

The silence is unusual and deep, almost suffocating, and it surprises Chris to find that he's really gotten so used to having company, someone within reach at all times. 

Shaking his head, he gets up into the kitchen for a cup of coffee. Seems he really needs to book a nurse service, should he ever end up alone again. He doesn't like to go there in his head, doesn't want to think about Dael leaving for a mission or her career (which seems to be on hold, and he needs to ask her about it), but vows or not she'd still able to do whatever she wants with her future, and should never feel obligated to pamper him all the time.

The machine's slight noise dies with a gurgle, the smell of his preferred coffee brightening his mood. But the second the machine quiets, the eerie feeling intensifies again; and worse, there's suddenly an additional thought, the feeling that he's not alone here, that someone is watching him, tracking his activities. His breathing quickens as he turns his head to look into the illuminated corridor, then trains his eyes onto the ceiling to run his gaze over the corners. Of course there are no cameras. Of course there's nobody here. 

"Fuck it," he mutters and grabs the coffee to walk straight into the corridor. "See," he says to himself, "there's nobody here. They're all out, and the doc will be back in an hour and I'll sit down on the couch now and wait for him." 

The doorbell rings, cutting through his attempt at rationalizing. He jerks so hard, hot coffee spills over his hand but he doesn't feel a thing. 

The bell _shouldn't_ ring. Nobody should visit. Nobody has a reason to come for him tonight. It must be his imagination. 

But then the doorbell rings again, violently noisy to his ears, and there _is_ someone out there and he just can't move.

The third, sharp attack finally snaps him out of the panicked freeze. It's just a doorbell. It's just a visitor. He could look to see who it is.

With shaky steps, he pushes the button for the outside camera. 

There's Mori Illyon, dressed in civilian attire.

Mori… She'd been a friend once.

He opens the door.

"Hello, Chris," she says, a strange smile on her face. "It's so good to see you. Can I come in?"

"No." The word slips out before he can even think about it. "No, you can't." 

"I just wanted to talk to you," she says, putting one hand on the door frame. 

"Outside. In ten minutes," Chris manages to say. He's relieved when she nods and turns, because he's not sure he would've been able to stop her from entering. When the door closes, he notices that he'd spilled half the coffee, his hands still shaking hard. 

_Fuck.  
_  
She'd been an old Academy friend of his, true, and their last contact had been about Asimov, he remembers vaguely. But today she's Head of Ship Operations, appointed by a man who, in the rare moments he dares to think about him at all, has become _The Goddamn Fucking Old Bastard_. The man he doesn't want to meet ever again because he wouldn't trust his reaction.

With effort Chris puts the cup away, wiping the spots on the floor with his t-shirt because it's the only thing he's got handy right now. Then he goes to dress, jeans, shirt and sneakers, and stands in front of the closed apartment door for at least ten more minutes.

He doesn't have to go down. He could ask the doorkeeper to not let her in a second time. He could…

She'd be back, he realizes. This hasn't happened by chance, it's been perfect timing. Just when he's alone… So maybe someone is tracking him after all, knows where he is, whether he's alone or not. He shivers.

Taking his communicator, he thinks about calling the doc, but that would only prove he can't manage on his own for even an hour. He puts it back in his pocket.

 _Fuck Mori. Fuck Starfleet.  
_  
Using his suddenly flaring anger like a shield, he walks out and down the staircase.

"Chris," she greets him when he joins here in front of the apartment house. "Already wondered if you'd forgotten about me."

He couldn't remember her voice ever having sounded so false and insincere. "Let's take a walk," he mutters, steering away from the direction of the park with the duck pond which to him belongs to his tribe.

"What do you want?" he asks harshly. 

She tries putting a hand on his arm, but he pulls away. Raising her hand in a quiet apology, she takes a step away from him. "Chris, hey, it's me, your friend Mori. I just wanted to know how you are."

"We aren't friends any longer," he states reflexively, although it sounds a little overly dramatic even to his own ears. "Not since…" He shakes his head.

Mori sighs. "What should I have done? Said no to the old man's offer?"

"If you had been smart, yes."

She shrugs, a silent _just because you went overboard doesn't mean we'd all do that._

"Leave me alone. I've got no business anymore with Starfleet."

"Then why don't you resign?" she asks bluntly. "You could do that any time. Hell, many people are waiting for you to do it."

"I'm still on medical leave. I don't have to decide anything."

She laughs, shoving her hands in the pockets of her jeans. "I know you. Starfleet is your life. You never even knew what to do with a decent shoreleave. You don't hate the 'fleet, you hate the people who did that to you, and that Nogura didn't do anything against it. But that doesn't mean you hate Starfleet, because that would mean hating Kirk and McCoy for still being in it. I know people who do that, they write flaming mails and distribute propaganda vids. You don't hate the 'fleet any more than I do." 

She looks up, meeting his wary gaze. "And that's why you don't resign, Chris, and never will."

"You're wrong," he says tonelessly.

"Oh, I am? Let's see." She whips out a small PADD. "Here, I saved you the pain of filling in your details. You only have to sign."

He mutely stares at the resignation form that appears on the screen; he knows it, having it filled out once in a while over the last decades in a moment of flaring anger or bone-deep frustration. He only had to sign to get out of the 'fleet, full honors, full pension. He'd be a free man.

His hands don't move.

At last, he turns away, defeated. "What do you want, Mori?" he asks again, curling his fingers against the onset of trembling.

She puts the PADD away and manages not to sound triumphant as she says, "I want you to come back to the Admiralty."

"What for?"

"For the Borg task force."

"You're kidding. And I know it's been dismantled."

"Parts of it are still active. We badly need someone for the science team."

"There are better people than me."

"We tried, but the scientists hated them all. They keep asking for you."

"I'm a security risk. I'm out of order." He waves at his head. 

"We'll see to that."

"I sleep twelve hours a day just to stay functional. I'm useless in an office job."

"We don't care where and how much you work, as long as you keep the specialists happy. Analysis showed that you only spent about fifteen hours a week with them and their information. You would be able to work these hours, wouldn't you?"

He laughs darkly. "Sometimes I think I'm crazy, but listening to you, I know where the real crazies are." But along with his impulsive reaction, there's suddenly a strange blossom of hope. 

"Just give it a thought. I don't want to pressure you. Can't deny that quite a few officers would be relieved to see you gone from their ranks for good, but I'm not among them. We've got an important task at hand and you're the man who can do it."

She almost touches his arm. "We need you, Chris, and you need us."

"I hate Nogura. I hate Esteban. Can you make sure that I'll never see them again in my life?" he asks. "Because I might try to kill them."

"Maybe I could. Please. All I want is that you give it some serious thought. Talk with your family, get their opinion. I'm sure they'll see the positive aspects of this."

"I doubt that." 

Mori nudges his arm, and this time he's too worn-out to pull away. "Chris — I could use some more allies in the HQ."

"I'm touched," is his stiff response. "You must be in a pretty weak position if you need a nutcase like me for support."

"That's how you see yourself?" she asks with a probing gaze.

"Not on good days," Chris says. "Mori…"

"Take your time. I'll ask you again in a few days." She lightly hugs him, clay arms around his numb body, a waxen cheek touching his. "No matter your decision, I'm so glad you're on the way to recovery. Have a good time and give my best to your folks." When she leaves him, he looks after her in frozen indecision until the cool night drives him home.

*** 

The doc finds him on the couch, curled in a blanket and uselessly trying to get his shaking hands under control.

"Hey, what's wrong?" 

"Just all a bit too much, I guess," Chris mutters, unwilling to relate Mori's surprise visit which would only trouble his tribe. He sighs in relief as a hypo is pressed against his neck, relaxation setting in seconds later.

"So all good when we leave you alone?" Leonard says more than a little annoyed. "Can't go away for an hour without you getting worked up. Dammit, Chris. You don't know your own limits right now." There's exasperated silence for a moment, before his lover continues, "Did you phone any of the therapists I recommended to you?"

"Not yet," Chris admits. 

"If you think you'll get over your current issues just from sitting them out, then -"

"I don't, doc. I'm just not sure they can help me either."

Leonard rolls his eyes. "You don't know if you won't even try." He snatches his PADD, opening the list before pushing the device at Chris. "Choose three for an appointment. Talk to them. Make your choice, or try out the next ones."

"Choose for me," Chris says blankly. "I just… fuck."

"If I make an appointment, will you go?"

"Yes."

"Okay. I'll pick my personal favorite, and we'll get you there. If you want me to, I'll come with you. I can wait outside, or even come in."

Chris nods tiredly. "That might be good." The way he's right now he's fucking useless for his tribe, and he needs to do something about it very, very quickly. They all deserve better, especially Dael.

Leonard seems to have read his mind. "You've got an awesome young woman wanting to be your wife." Chris draws a face. "And stop hating that word, that's what people call it. You've got an awesome woman ready to stick to you in good and bad times, and god knows she's had her share of bad times with you already. So if you're half the man I think you are, you’ll get up and do _anything_ to get better, if not for yourself, then for her."

"I’ll try, doc. But it's pretty steep." Chris looks away. "Sometimes I'm not sure I'll make it." Actually, the fear of failure is a regular companion since the moment he'd decided to go home.

"You either make it… or if not, fuck hell, then go and kill yourself for good because what you did was the worst thing you could do to us… dammit." Leonard turns away, wiping one hand over his face as if it could stop the sobs that come out of it. 

Chris shudders from the blow of these words, the incredible, undisguised pain in the doc's voice. He's never seen his lover suffer like that. "I'll manage, Leonard. I promise." He reaches out, relieved when his lover catches his hand. "I'll do it. For us all."

***

Jim and Dael return only half an hour later, and Chris feels sorry for them, both for their obviously unsuccessful outing as well as for noticing his fragile state, still curled on the couch with a cup of Dael's favorite tea in his hand. The idea of sex had gone out of the door by his kind-of breakdown and Leonard's persistently unhappy gaze. On the beach, Leonard had never pushed like that. Here in the city, it starts to feel like subtle but relentless pressure, and Chris doesn't quite know whether he'll bend or break under it. 

The doc and Jim vanish for presumably a shower, possibly sex, while Dael joins him, slipping onto the couch next to him in her full party outfit, all dark leather and bright blue makeup, her hair wildly styled. Lowering the PADD with the information about the psychiatrist of Leonard's choosing, he pulls her into a kiss. 

She smells of something similar to incense and a bit of leather, and he sniffs along her chin. There's also a trace of Jim's preferred shower gel, and he licks along the trace, gently biting her earlobe. It feels good beneath his teeth, sweet flesh, soft and a tingle of her sweat behind it. One of her hands runs over his chest and up to his neck, deepening their kiss. They keep going for a while before he pulls away with a sigh, his back slightly aching from the position. Still an arm around her shoulder, they settle more comfortably next to each other, her legs pressing against his through the blanket.

Dael's gaze drifts to the PADD, and he gives it over to her. 

"So you chose a therapist?" she asks.

"The doc picked one for me, because I asked him to." He sighs. "I need one, doesn't really matter who. There isn't a quick fix, the doc likes to say."

She puts the PADD aside. "I'm not sure he's right."

Chris strokes her shoulder in silence. 

"You could see a Vulcan healer."

"Could I?" He looks at her in surprise. "I often got the impression that you didn't like your stay on New Vulcan. That they couldn't help you the way you needed it." 

"It's complicated. Some of them did a lot of good for me, but I knew that many Vulcans didn't want us to stay there. There was so much anger and hate directed at Raol and me, I started to hate them back. It was illogical and… ungrateful." Deal leans her head against his shoulder. "The healers had a hard time with me and almost gave up; only one persisted. Without her intervention, I would probably have turned insane." She falls silent.

"What's the price you had to pay?" he asks. Because everything comes at a price.

Dael smiles sadly. "From my point of view — none, because it was either that or not having anything resembling a normal life for years, maybe never. But I understand what you mean." She takes one of the drawing pads that started to populate the apartment, flipping it open to get a new sheet of paper, then takes a black pen.

"Imagine this would be the emotional range of a human —" She draws a horizontal line, then a sinusoidal curve that crosses that line. "The line is your baseline, the curve are the variations you can feel. Happiness, sadness… depression." She points at one especially low inflection point.

"What she did, is this." She draws two more horizontal lines, one above, one below the baseline. 

"She cut off the maxima," Chris says.

"Exactly." Dael takes a slow breath. "I've heard it's not much different from what they do with medication but that never worked well for me." Lost in thought, her finger drifts along one cut-off maximum.

"It doesn't mean I don't feel anything, I just… can't feel it completely. I can remember what it’s like to feel so much joy that one's heart wants to burst, but I cannot experience that anymore. However, I also can't feel anymore how it is to lose all hope." She casts Chris a glance. "They didn't think I'd make it. They thought Raol… but they didn't consider that the baseline is set within the individual. They can't shift that one. Only you can do that for yourself." 

"And how does your baseline look like?" Chris asks.

"Before we met, it was here." The pen's tip comes to rest at the baseline she's drawn. "After that…" It moves strongly upwards, quite to the maxima, and she looks at him with a small smile. "You changed so much for me. You don't even know how much." 

Chris softly caresses her neckline. "Same here." Then he asks, eyes back to the drawing, "Wouldn't it be possible just to dampen the negative feelings?"

"Maybe someone could do that, but they can't. They're Vulcans. They don't think that there are good and bad emotions — all emotions experienced in excess are dangerous." She draws small circles with the pen. "Considering that all mood medication has similar effects, they probably have a point." She looks up at him. "Please don't tell Jim. He sometimes tries so hard to make me overwhelmingly happy, and I don't have the heart to tell him that it won't work like he thinks. That I'll never feel as intensely as he wants me to."

He pulls her close, holding her in a quiet promise. His eyes still on her drawing, he starts wondering about what else Vulcan healers could do. "What about your memories?"

She stiffens. "What about them?"

"Do you remember everything that happened? Was there anything you wanted to forget? Could they take that away from you, at your request?" 

She shakes her head, but there's something odd all of a sudden, an insecurity in her eyes as if she's not sure herself.

"There was a ritual… k'sh'nin, Lady T'Pelei called it… it took the edge off, made things easier." 

"The edge off…" He combs through her hair in thoughts, ruining her perfect wave to create the chaos he likes so much. "Guess I'll try the traditional method first," he says at last. "It's taken me so long to allow my feelings, I'd rather not cut them off right away."

Dael nods, head slightly bowed. "I understand. I just didn't have a choice." 

He frowns at how much she makes it sound like an apology, wonders if she feels disabled at times — it might be, considering that she doesn't want Jim to know.

"Thank you for telling me about it. It's good to know there are alternatives for me, even if I might never need them. And I love to learn more about your past. To me, you are perfect, just the way you are." 

He kisses her forehead, and is relieved to feel her relaxing in his embrace.

***

The therapist the doc delivers him to is younger than Chris, and of an almost Greek beauty. His name is Ralph… Ralph something. He can't remember the fairly complicated East-European family name. 

He'd thought the gap between reality and whatever is going on in his head is deep, but in fact, it's wide, wide as the polished wood that stretches between them, shimmering mahogany. Chris manages to say not a single word through the first ten minutes, only clamps his hands around the arms of the chair, trying to breathe. He hadn't thought it would be so damn hard.

"Walk with me," the man says and they step out into a small garden together. At least, fresh air.

"Why did you come?" Ralph asks, repeating the question from the very beginning, and Chris curls his hands, searching for words. He must try, for them. For Dael and Jim and Leonard, for the time that's ticking away for the four of them. It's five weeks until the _Enterprise_ leaves, possibly five years until his implant might fail — too little time for them. 

"I need to be able to live a normal life again. Or at least, be able to live with the others without alienating them." 

Chris knows he does that. He tends to be just a little bit out of tune with the others, unable to adjust to more than one person at any given moment, his thoughts and focus always ready to shift and move on like an elusive ghost. The four of them had sex a few times together, and he likes these focal, beautiful moments but then his mind disintegrates and things go blurry, and sometimes he leaves and spends an hour on the terrace, staring holes into the dark floor because moving would mean thinking would mean facing things.

Or maybe he thinks that because Leonard thinks that.

"Why don't you start by telling me a little about your tribe, as you call them?"

For the first few minutes, Chris stumbles over every word, disjoint adjectives hunting fleeting verbs; but then it all spills out like a story he'd always wanted to tell. It's only when he walks out of the building afterwards that he realizes the magnitude of things he'd just shared, a bout of nausea tightening his throat. He barely speaks with Leonard who's been waiting for him, barely remembers the ride in the cab home until he can curl around Dael, hiding from Leonard's questions in her shadow.

It's a bit unfair, to all of them.

***

"Did you kill Alain?"

Until a second ago, there'd been the normal layers of sound of six people around a dining table, forks clinking on dishes, chewing mouths, easy conversation.

"Did you, John?" Chris asks again.

The noise dies, all gazes moving to him. John, Jim, the doc, Dael, Eric. Wide eyes, pained eyes, slightly angry eyes.

Chris realizes his mistake. This is supposed to be a friendly dinner invitation, nothing else. John's been good. Has been on his side. He's got no right to ask.

"You've got every right," John says, seriously. "Let's talk about it after dinner, shall we?"

"Sure," he says. The noises return, more subdued.

When they walk away, he can feel the eyes of his tribe on his back. John pulls him into the bedroom.

"Chris…" John sighs. "Come here." His friend draws him into a strong embrace, then kisses him. 

He kisses back. It's a comfortable touch. 

"I didn't kill him, I promise. Can't blame you for thinking it, though. I might have, if I had found him." John gives him a crooked smile.

Chris nods.

"How are you doing?" John asks. "The real answer, not the dinner table bullshit."

"I'm doing okay." 

"Chris."

He looks away. "Could be worse, I guess. Started seeing a therapist but I doubt it will help." 

John massages his shoulder, easing his tense muscles. "You really want to marry Dael?"

"Only thing I want more is to have the four of us here on Earth," Chris says, though it's not completely true at the moment. He doesn't know how to deal with Leonard who wants more than he can give right now, but at the same moment insists that Jim not be tied to Earth now that his career is moving forward. He'll be sad to see them leave but Dael will be here with him and she's become home. Five years isn't long enough to see the end of Jim's career anyway. 

There's reality and there are dreams and sometimes he knows which is which. 

John's hand wanders up his neck. "She's a good girl."

"I need to get sane again."

John turns away, pouring a drink for them. "Last time I saw you," he says as he turns back, glasses in hand, "you did your best to ignore me and everyone around you. I'd say you've come a long way already."

Chris takes the offered drink. "Every achievement is fragile," he says. He had been better on the beach, had been able to talk sensibly with Iro in the end. And with Leonard.  
 _  
Leonard…  
_  
"Hey, stay with me," John says, unsuccessfully trying to hide his concern behind a sarcastic smile. "My whiskey's too good not to savor it."

His cloverleaf is glad to leave shortly after. 

***

Both Jim and the doc spend a lot of their time on the _Enterprise_ refit, though they never talk about the details. At first, Chris thinks this has something to do with security advice they'd received, but then he finds Jim and Dael sitting in the kitchen talking about the ship. They immediately shut up on his arrival. 

_It's not paranoia when they're really out to get you_ , he remembers an old, ironic proverb.

He knows they're close. It looks gorgeous, the two of them together, quite different to what he has with each of them. 

But he doesn't like this abrupt silence.

Next time he waits outside, and stops breathing when Jim talks about Esteban.

***

The next morning, the therapy session is on the beach and they sit there and Chris wants to speak about Esteban, but he just can't, the name stuck in his throat like a piece of iron bar. He'd told Mori he hated the man, but it's a strangely emotionless hate layered with a more solid angst and helplessness. Esteban has turned larger than life in his head, he knows that but can't help it — a demon out to get him.

That the night, in his first nightmare in a while, Chris is tied down by cloaked ghouls, his mouth forced open wide before a man with a white mask pushes a slick, large dick down his throat, again and again. He arches, choking and fighting in panicked agony. When he comes to, hands hold him down while he's still choking, everything hurting, tears running down his face.  
 _  
"Chris, it's just a dream, breathe, Chris, it's not real."_

 _"Set him free. Do it."  
_  
The hands leave him abruptly, and he rolls from the bed to the ground, coughing his lungs out. 

"I can't do it," he whimpers when they put him back in bed later, two loads of tranquilizer in his bloodstream. "I can't." It's one thing to know you're broken, it's another to walk over your own broken pieces with naked feet. 

Dael caresses his face. "We'll help you through," she says softly, and he can imagine her taking care of her brother like this, holding the boy through the nightmares that had to haunt him. "We're here for you."

Behind her, his men look concerned. 

Raol killed himself. Her care wasn't enough.

It's no good.

***

There are only two states of the doc right now; either he's solely absorbed into Jim's orbit, or he's in a strange kind of competition for Chris with Dael. Chris is so tired of it.

"I don't want the two of you to fight over me," he says as he corners the doc later that day, stopping him from following Jim and Dael into the kitchen. 

"I don't. I know when I've got to step back," Leonard says stiffly. "And I guess it's better, considering that you don't seem to be working very hard on getting better." 

There's accusation and frustration, out in the open. The gap is wide and it's a four letter name.

Chris lowers his head. "I try. But I'm still not sure I'll make it." His chest hurts. The room darkens.

Leonard's hand is warm on his cheek. "Dammit, Chris, you've come this far, don't give up now just because it takes a little time."

"We don't have that time. There've got to be other solutions." 

Leonard sighs. "The human brain isn't a piece of machinery."

"Mine is." He slips his hands under the hem of Leonard's shirt. The need to touch his elusive lover is overwhelming, leaving everyone else out. "Because of you."

"If it were so easy to fix you, I'd put every damn implant in your head that I could," Leonard mutters but doesn't push him away. "It's all in your hands now, Chris." 

"Need you, doc. Please." He tugs him towards his bedroom, and his lover follows with a last gaze at the kitchen door.

Seems Leonard wants him too, judging from the haste the doc gets him naked and then grabs the lube, only superficially preparing them. In a moment like this with only the two of them, Chris can't help the feeling he'd had when he'd made the recording, that terrible piece that should've never left the planet. 

"You still can have all of me," he whispers as the doc pushes in hard, clamping his legs around strong hips.

"No, I can't," the doc states but his eyes are all about claiming.

***

Chris sees the therapist once more, but it still doesn't feel as if anything is changing for the better. Instead, it's like he's surfing the wrong wave, the one that pulls him out into the ocean, and his feet are glued to the board and he just can't leap. The nightmares return every night, and he stalls sleep now, staying up restlessly for as long as he can manage.

But he says nothing of that when Nat visits him. 

"It's so good to see you." She sits next to him on the terrace, coffee and cake on the table. "Sorry I couldn't come faster, our trip developed a few unplanned detours." She looks a little worn down herself but he doesn't ask, feeling utterly unable to offer any supportive words. Instead he says, "No problem. I've got three babysitters already, that's more than I can manage." A poor joke. 

She takes his hand gently. "We’re having a family gathering at Tom's farm next weekend. Everyone would be happy to see you all."

He thinks about it for a moment — remembering the gatherings of the past, the long ride, the many people, imagines them asking him about his whereabouts, imagines the faces of his lovers when they politely lie about how they really feel about all this.

He curls away from her touch. "I can't. Sorry, Nat, I really can't." 

There's pained understanding in her eyes. "It's okay, Chris. It's okay. Maybe next time."

"Maybe, yes."

After a short silence, they resume talking, chat about this and that but it's as if their worlds are out of tune, and he knows it's all his fault.

Strangely, it's Jim who accepts the invitation on his and Dael's behalf, when Nat asks them on the way out.

"Didn't know he liked those family meet-ups that much," Chris wonders as they see them off on Saturday.

Leonard just shrugs, but there's a thoughtful expression in his eyes too.

"At least this way, we've got the day all to ourselves," Chris says. 

"Can't imagine what we could do with it." The thoughtful expression quickly changes into a twinkle, as one of the doc's hands drifts onto Chris' hip bone. 

***

Chris stretches out on the bed. They've been having sex for an hour, maybe, and the first physical urges have been pacified, the feeling of relaxation already receding under the tingle of new pressure building. It's been good, but there's something missing.

"Stop being so nice," he says.

"Uh?" Leonard frowns.

"Stop treating me like a child. Stop treating me like something fragile that needs protection all of the time."

They stare at each other.

"And don't tell me I _really_ need protection all of the time."

The doc snorts. "On a scale of 0 to 10, what do you think about your own state?"

"Right now, it's…6." It's just the two of them, in bed, the world is small and definite and secure. His last medication has been a few hours ago, he feels awake and lively.

"And that means…?"

"Be less gentle. Just for once." Once upon a time, they'd fight and push and tie each other up. There'd been pain, the good kind.

"I can't, Chris. Sorry about that." Leonard mutters and leaves the bed, going for a shower.

Chris turns in bed, his body suddenly hurting and cold. There are books on his nightstand. There’s a poem he knows, and he starts reading the lines, rolling the alien sounds in his mind.

They spend the rest of the day in silence.

***

Dael's room, despite still making him feeling a bit like an alien in it, becomes his new hiding place. He likes watching her painting, and while he's absolutely no art connoisseur, he can't shake the feeling that her paintings have gained new depths lately.

Not all of them are cornflowers or beaches, though; there's also a decidedly darker current in the newest ones, but she evades his few questions. She makes up for her walling-off by being especially caring, shielding him from wielded hypos and threats to get for once and for all dragged to SFM for the check-up he needs, and still fears to his core. 

The doc never enters this room, sends Jim as his messenger instead — or maybe Jim comes on his own behalf sometimes, trying to make Dael join him for a night out. 

Chris doesn't mind when she declines and stays home with him instead.

***

The therapist wants him to speak about his fears. 

Or write.

There's a fifty percent chance that he'll recover fully. He'd extrapolated the number from data in the Nets and asked for the therapist's professional opinion.

Of course the man had lied, but he knows better.

5 -5 -5 -5 -5

Five years. Fifty percent.

He cuts each of the Klingon _peb'ot_ that Dael had bought in two times five pieces.

Dael estimates five times five minutes of cooking.

"You could paint them, you know," she says out of the blue. "The things you fear."

He puts the knife aside. "How do you paint insanity?" 

She looks so small, all of a sudden, past terror around her like an aura. "For me, it was not-painting. Scratching all colors off the walls…" She curls her fingers.

He wants to hold her but she shakes her head. "I need a timeout for a moment," she says and rushes out. 

He can hear her crying and knows it's not real, it's only in his head, she never cries, she's been fixed by Vulcan healers, her broken pieces all neat and shiny.

He resumes cutting the vegetables, the knife heavy in his hand, the fruit bleeding under its onslaught.

***

It's become second nature to him to wait briefly behind doors, listening first to what is said in the room. It's just precaution, he tells himself. Just the need to know, to find out what they wouldn't say to his face. Like this discussion between the doc and Dael.

 _"You expected a miracle."_  
 _  
_He's careful to keep out of their sight, outside the living room.  
 _  
"It will take time. Maybe he'd be better off in a full-time institution once we're gone, at least for a while."_

_"No."_

_"It's great how you stand with him, but I'm not sure it's the best solution for you. He never wanted to stand in the way of your life and career and if you marry him, that will happen, Dael."  
_  
Just five years. It's not too much to ask for, right?

There's silence, silence.  
 _  
"You want to give up your own life for him, just be his caretaker?"  
_  
The doc is jealous. That's all there is. The doc won't be satisfied until Dael and he are separated.

 _"That's not your problem, Leonard."_ Dael is angry. _"You'll take Jim and leave him, that's what you always do. Stop pretending that this is really about me, you don't care shit about me. I don't need your advice."  
_  
 _"I care more about you than you like, and I don't want to see you fall apart over him when we're away. Jim doesn't want to see that either, and he shares my opinion that staying with Chris won't be good for you."_

 _"You won't be here anyway. So just. Shut. Up."_ There's movement, and he ducks into his bedroom, hiding from her as she rushes out.

"See, you knew it would never work," Alain says from his seated position on the bed.

"You're not here," Chris says firmly. "You're not real." He blindly throws a shirt onto the bed, then opens his eyes to an empty room. A neat trick. The only good one the therapist has delivered so far.

So Jim also wants Dael to leave him.

Jim spoke about Esteban.

Maybe he'd never known the full truth, who had really taken part in the conspiracy against him.

***

They stop talking when he enters the kitchen the next morning.

Jim smiles. Chris doesn't like that smile. It's an unnatural smile.

Dael smiles too.

He nods and leaves, and they start talking again.  
 _  
Enterprise. Esteban. Nogura.  
_  
She's in.

He feels sick, too sick to keep listening.

 

"Can I do something for you?" Dael asks when poking her head into the bedroom shortly afterwards.  
 _  
Stop lying to me._

 __"No," he says tersely and turns away from her.

 

He tries reading every unlocked PADD he can find, checking all the computers.

There's nothing on them, of course. All information is top secret. He's not allowed to read it anymore.

They hide things from him.

The therapist asks about his relationships. He pretends all is fine.

He doesn't tell the man that Jim's going behind his back, probably all three of them are.

 

He only eats things he prepares himself. After all, Alain had drugged his food so it's to be expected they'll do so too.  
 _  
"He's getting worse. I'm really concerned."_

_"Bones, you're painting it too black. Just because he gets a little obsessive about food doesn't mean a thing. Just yesterday he asked me about the Enterprise, which he hadn't done since his breakdown. Isn't that a good sign?"_

He keeps listening behind doors until they notice and he needs to stop it.

"See, I told you it'll never work," Alain says, unmoved by a thrown shirt.

He needs more medication but he doesn't trust the doc anymore.

The doc wants him in an institution.

Just three weeks until they leave. He can pretend that long.

He never speaks about the partnership ceremony anymore.

***

They arrange a beam-out to the farm. 

"Ashaire is getting really bored, you need to look after him," Jim teases him. 

But Chris doesn't want to leave the apartment. God knows where they'd beam him to. If he vanished, nobody would look for him. He'd just be gone. It's not as if anyone cares. John never phones anymore. Nat never phones anymore.

"We had another dinner invitation," Dael reminds him.

"You know John lied about me," Alain says into his ear. "Maybe he didn't pull the trigger but he knows what really happened to me."

Chris' life takes places between bedroom, bath and terrace. He barely sleeps, torn between nightmares and the fear of what _they_ will do if he closes his eyes.

On a scale between 0 and 10…

…

On a scale…

***

He knows he's lost it not because he remembers any of it, but because Jim has a black eye and looks terrified, Leonard manages to look angry, helpless and sad at the same time, and Dael is nowhere to be seen.

Things blur after the hypo but when he wakes up, it's to an empty bed. Leonard sits in the corner, far away, guarding his sleep… guarding him.

"Shit, Chris," the doc says. "Shit."

***

Jim wants him to sit down.

"Keep seated," Jim orders and walks around the table to take the chair on the other end.

Jim still has a black eye, and looks like… 

Chris doesn't have a word for it.

The doc stands in the corner to his left, arms crossed.

"Frank." Jim clears his throat. "Frank was a drinker. And he was a psycho. For a long time I didn't understand that he was ill. And when I got it, it didn't really change a thing. He was ill and never got help, just acted out his rage and self-hate on anyone smaller than him. I still hate him more than I can pity him."

Jim's hand curl into fists. "That I even sit here, facing you, is hard for me. And you know there's a reason why Dael isn't here. Because she absolutely cannot deal with people having violent outbursts."

"It wasn't about her…" 

"You came into the kitchen like a maniac. You shouted at me and managed to land a blow before I could stop you. You struggled and kept cussing at us until Bones could give you a tranquilizer." 

"You spoke about Esteban," Chris sputters. "You _worked_ together with Esteban against me." It feels strange to say it.

"Do you believe that? Do you really believe that?" Jim asks gravelly.

Chris curls his finger into his hair, pulling at it. Ponders what he knows, considers real in his mind, which feels slow-working but still strangely clear with the medication. "No."

"Good. Because the only thing I did was fly a maneuver with Esteban before the Enterprise arrived on Earth. That was all, and we were ordered to do it."

"A maneuver."

"Just that. Like there are hundreds each year."

"Esteban thought I'd sold Dael to you. Had forced her to have sex with you."

"I know."

"Thought I needed to be removed from the admiralty before I could corrupt morals any more, or could ruin the reputation of the 'fleet."

Jim reaches over, putting his palm on Chris' arm to calm him. "I know that he obviously thought the worst of you," Jim repeats, "but I tried to be professional and the maneuver worked just fine. No matter his opinions about you or any of us, he is a good captain."

"I know. That's why I wanted him once." Chris hangs his head. "What can I say? A part of me knew I was getting worse but another part was sure that this was because you were all working against me. Trying to get rid of me. Poisoning me like… you know."

He looks at them, hoping for understanding. They understand, but it's not enough. It doesn't really change a thing. "Where's Dael?"

"Currently with Arissa."

He nods. "Maybe you were right, doc. Put me away in some institution that can deal with me, because I don't think I can deal with it myself. And you can't either. Dael can't."

He expects the doc to resist his idea, but instead Leonard says flatly, defeated, "Maybe it would be the best solution after all. I thought you'd manage, but right now, it doesn't look like it."

Chris is tired. He wants to sleep forever, just zone out and die. 

Suddenly, Jim gets to his feet, agitatedly walking back and forth. "Something's just wrong about all this," he states sharply, and it's a posture Chris could imagine on the bridge of the flagship, concentrated and determined. "Everything was fine while the two of you were on the beach, then you come here and everything goes downhill again."

"Guess it was too early," Chris mutters, and Leonard nods in agreement, guilt tangible in his expression. "Maybe we just wanted too much," Leonard says. 

"Maybe, but maybe it was something completely different. Some external influence outside of the four of us." Jim paces up and down the kitchen. "Chris, when did you start to feel worse?"

"Practically from the first day here, so —"

"Your mood and concentration kept going downhill?"

Chris thinks back, wishing he could refute this, but finally he says with a fatalistic sigh, "They did."

"Bones, you didn't expect that, did you?"

Leonard shakes his head. "I expected some problems, but not the downfall Chris seems to have experienced — and hidden pretty well too," he adds with a frustrated gaze at Chris.

"Now, come on, you behaved a little strange too," Jim says. "The way you suddenly clashed with Dael, so jealous and possessive, always thinking the worst about her —"

"I don't think badly about her, I just still think she's not the right person for Chris," Leonard blurts out. 

"That's old bullshit," Jim says coolly, "And you had gotten over that even before she nurtured Chris back from his isolation. You told me, your own words — _we're so lucky to have her, she's the best thing that happened to Chris in a long time_."

"So what, opinions can change," Leonard barks. 

Chris curls on his chair, the feeling of being a traitor to both the doc and Dael intense and painful, even through the layers of drugs in his mind.

Jim shakes his head, then straightens, his command persona in full gear. "Bones, why don't you put Chris back to bed, he's really done, and I'll start a little investigation here." 

The doc wants to say something, but a wave of Jim's hand makes him shut up. "Something stinks, and I ignored it for far too long enough because I was too busy and trusted in your professional opinion. I don't know what went wrong but I'm not just giving up on Chris, even if the two of you do."

"Fine, _Captain_ ," Leonard says stiffly and jerks one hand into an insulting half-salute, showing off his aggravation. "You coming, Chris?"

Chris starts thinking again when he's in bed, staring at the ceiling. "I should've done it, you know."

"What?" Leonard asks roughly while getting out of clothes — but not his underwear - and settling in bed a certain distance from Chris.

"Should've killed myself when I noticed it all getting worse."

There's a deep sigh coming from the man near to him. "Fuck no, Chris. Even if your state was caused by being with us, there's always a better solution."

"You said yourself, that I should kill myself rather than subject you to any more pain."

The mattress shifts as Leonard gets up on one elbow, leaning closer to him. "I never said something that terrible." 

"You did, in the night when Mori was here."

"Mori?" Leonard looks at him with a disbelieving frown. "When was that supposed to be?"

Chris just shrugs and closes his eyes. He'd been stupid to mention suicide to the doc; now they'd take precautions that would make it much harder.

"If I ever said something like that, I'm sorry, Chris. So damn sorry." Leonard draws closer. "Part of me knows I've behaved like an asshole lately, and I don't know why. Maybe Jim's right and something is influencing us."

Chris turns his head away, unwilling to meet the doc's eyes. He's got enough of false hopes. He's done with that shit.

"Chris…" Leonard whispers and strokes his arm, giving up quickly when he doesn't react. They fall silent, and Chris soon drifts into sleep. 

***

When Chris wakes up from his dreamless, drugged nap, it's to a voice outside — make that voices, he reconsiders while listening to the murmurs. The bed next to him is empty, and he's relieved that he doesn't have to face Leonard right away. He's an experiment gone wrong, weighing the others down by his sheer existence. 

The door opens. "Hey." Leonard pokes his head in with a strange smile, "you better get dressed, we've got visitors and they need to get into the bedroom."

"Visitors?" Chris says confused, but Leonard has already shut the door, so he dresses into presentable jeans and a shirt, pulls on sneakers and leaves the room. 

The corridor is empty except for one man in a brown, ugly, knitted sweater with his back to Chris, and for a second he can't place him — then he takes in the pointed ears and the neatest hair cut he's ever seen, and blurts out, "Spock!"

The man turns, and it's indeed his former — and now Jim's — first officer. "Admiral," Spock says and examines him intensely. "It is good to see you in improved health."

Chris shakes his head. "I might be walking but my mind is fucked up beyond repair," he says. 

The Vulcan tilts his head and raises one brow, saying solemnly, "The human mind is a very interesting place. Its innate chaos is both the ground for high creativity as well as great disturbance, and it is easy to get lost in it."

"Nicely put, Spock." From the kitchen, Chris can hear two others voices discussing something. "What are you doing here? Where are the others?" 

"I asked them to wait outside on the terrace while we commence with our search. Please, let me accompany you." In a strangely tender gesture, Spock offers him an arm to laces his hand through, and Chris accepts, too confused to resist. 

"What are you looking for?" 

"We do not know yet. But if there is anything that is not supposed to be in an Earth household, we will locate it." Spock delivers him into the hands of Jim, who almost giddily pulls him out onto the terrace and makes him sit down on a chair, offering him a cup of coffee. Chris ignores the doc's critical gaze, clamping his fingers around the hot mug. Coffee is still his elixir of life, and while it's a bit cool outside here, the brew warms him from inside out. The other two are speaking but he's not listening, only noticing their emotions — agitation and hope. Someone tucks a blanket around him, and he smiles in sleepy thanks, almost gone again when the voices from inside rise in level. A minute later Spock walks through the door, delivering the unbelievable.

"I believe we have found something."

***

In the whirl of people that start flooding the apartment Chris had always thought of as his very private retreat, he doesn't mind at all being taken away to a more silent place. He must be really quite out of it, thanks to yet another shot of whatever the doc has given him, as it takes him several minutes to recognize the apartment.

Mostly he recognizes the bed as he sinks onto the wide mattress. 

"We'll take care of everything," John says, drawing the blanket over him and putting a kiss on his forehead. "Can't believe someone played your tribe like this. Fuck, this time someone's really gonna pay."

Chris closes his eyes. He tries to convince himself that Spock had really said those words, but there's hope and there's despair and the meds aren't good enough to bridge between those feelings. 

After his sleep, Chris decides, everything will be good. Dael will be here, and the doc, and things will be explained to him and he'll be sure he's not dreaming.

***  
 _  
"Our men found selective theta frequency electromagnetic wave generators in the walls and ceiling."_

_"The waves work like amplifiers to emotional regions of the brain, while reducing the frontal lobe's ability for rational thinking. In experiments, people have been known to lose contact with reality, exhibiting signs of schizophrenia._

_"They might have been there for months, but obviously were triggered now. Intentionally or not, we don't know yet."_

__It's not exactly wonderland Chris had woken up to. Instead it's a private briefing for the five of them — his tribe and John — around the living room table in John's apartment.

Chris feels like he’s in a strange dream, the sentences like children playing games with him, allusions of explanations. The chair is hard, the cup of coffee warm. He's up but not quite — _up_. Dael sits on the other side of the table, distant and distanced from everyone, arms defensively folded in front of her leather jacket. 

It's a weird number for this table, _five_ , he thinks with a frown. 

"Chris -" the doc says loudly, pulling him out of his straying thoughts. "Do you need something?" _A shot, whatever._

"No, thanks," he manages. "Okay. So there was an outside influence?" 

"Yes." The doc nods, his shoulders low in defeat. "How could I miss that… I really should've thought about something like that."

"Stop beating yourself up over it," Jim says. "When I first heard about that supposed conspiracy against Chris, I couldn't really believe it. Okay, there's political bullshit like in every other large organization, but I couldn't really imagine an actual, thought-through plan. T _his_ really shakes me up. Why the hell would anyone do it?"

Everyone looks at Chris. He shrugs helplessly. "I have no idea. Was this really targeted at us or just bad luck? What about the beach?" 

"We’ve already ordered a team there," John says. "Considering that you were much better off there, I don't think they'll find anything." 

Dael nods, for the first time opening her mouth. "I checked the house twice a day. No guarantees but I think it was clean. I definitely never felt anything like in the weeks here."

"And when Dael was gone, we infiltrated the beach crew with one of our men, who performed the same checks every morning," John says matter-of-factly.

The doc stares at John. "Why didn't you ask me, didn't you trust me?"

"You have been too busy with Chris." John smiles crookedly. 

"So you've been working for John all the time?" Chris addresses Dael, surprised.

"Not really, but I gave her some backup and advice. Someone tried to get rid of you, least we could do was take some precautions. Just wish we had taken the same care here. I have little doubt that this was a targeted attack," John states, going ahead before Chris could ask for more information on Dael's tasks.

He accepts the diversion to the more pressing problem. "I still don't get it. Why now? I'm not important to Starfleet anymore."

"It might have started by chance. The generators may have been in the apartment for months, it's impossible to tell," the doc says.

"You had a very important position as the leader of the Borg task force," Jim says. "And despite your reluctance to fill that position, you _were_ Nogura's crown prince."

"It's long over," Chris mutters. "Why should that give anyone a reason to…" Not kill him, no — the goal had been to ruin his mental health once again, this time for good. The realization sparks anger in the midst of his drugged, depressed mood. "To get me out of commission. Out of any productive future," he says more clearly. "Revenge for something?"

John looks unconvinced. "If this was a timed attack, whoever caused it was very interested in removing you from your position and making you appear unreliable and delusional. Maybe you know something important that isn't in the documentation of the project?"

Chris searches his memories. "Well, there were those weapon tests that I refused to sign off on, which Esteban cleared via Shaa's people in Nogura's office."

The group perks up. "Weapon tests?" Jim asks roughly.

"Some weapons and other features that I believed weren't ready for testing on Utopia Planitia yet, but Esteban pushed them past me. The first of them was the dredger torpedo."

Jim swears under his breath. "I got more complaints about it than about anything else. But whenever Scotty reported a problem, the engineers in headquarters made it look as if we were too stupid to handle their fine piece of high-end technology. However… " He faces Chris squarely. "It was so volatile that we pulled the original specification and testing description from Starfleet databanks. The signature in the sign-off was yours, Chris."

"That's impossible," Chris says automatically. "I didn't sign." He looks around, noticing everyone frowning in doubt, not sure whether his memory could be trusted. For a second, he gets nervous and reconsiders, but he's absolutely sure. And what's better — he's got someone who can confirm it.

"Ask Cho," he says. "Commander Caren Cho. She called me when the dredger torpedo was signed off, asking me what had happened. She can testify that I never signed that order."

Jim nods. "I'll call her. I’ve always wanted to meet her." He looks at the doc with a smirk, then resumes the discussion. "Okay, so let's assume that various weapons were pushed through although they weren't ready, and it was considered important enough to falsify the signature in the signoff. Who would profit from it?" 

"The companies that produce them," John says. "It's not like Starfleet can do it all on their own, there are a lot of subcontractors working for them."

"Especially in the Borg project, as we were very short of internal resources," Chris adds.

"You said it went through Shaa's staff?" John asks.

"I think one of them signed off the dredger. It's possible that others from Nogura's staff signed the later tests that Esteban wanted to push through," Chris says, noticing that mentioning his adversary's name is a lot easier today than it's been for a long time. 

"Do you think Esteban is behind all this?" the doc asks curiously. 

A little wistful, Chris shakes his head. "No, I don't. He's been a pain in the ass but that was always about my private life. I don't have any reason to believe that he's working against the best interests of Starfleet."

"I agree," Dael says. "His concern for me was sincere, although misplaced." She meets Chris' eyes. "He talked to me after that terrible dinner and offered me his help if I wanted to leave _my unfortunate situation_. I tried to make him understand, but obviously not successfully." Her voice turns louder. "He was just another asshole who thought he knew me better than I know myself," she says sharply, and her dark eyes jerk to the doc who instantly lowers his head in quiet remorse. 

There's uncomfortable silence for a moment, then Jim says, "The generator worked on us all, Dael. Bones has been really good with your existence for a long time, and you know that. The last weeks — that wasn't him. That wasn't _us_."

Dael shrugs, apparently disinclined to just move on.

"Let's tackle this with logic," John says into the tense silence that follows their exchange, readying his PADD. "When I researched McAllister and Alain, I tried to find out whether someone else was behind it but McAllister always seemed to be the core. His motivation seemed too weak but I concluded that he had become obsessed with taking over the Borg task force from you, Chris." John's gaze corners him. "The main problem for my research was that we never really learned what Alain told you. I think it's about damn time that you speak up so that we have a chance for investigating further."

Everyone looks at him, and Chris feels like a deer in the headlights, sinking against the back of his chair. 

Leonard takes his hand. "You once asked me whether there was any truth in Alain's story, and I told that we can't answer that. So if you want to know — tell us. Please."

Maybe it would be easier for him to speak about Alain between the two of them, but laying his own stupidity out on the table in front of everyone is more than Chris can manage. His throat tight, he mutely shakes his head, withdrawing his hand from Leonard's touch. 

"What was Alain's story, come on, Chris," John pushes. "And I'll try not to think about the fact that you let that asshole into your bed again. — So what? Chris knows I'm right," John adds coolly when the others look at him accusingly. "Manipulations or not, Alain has been Chris' weak spot for the last ten years, just as you are now. So if we can't get behind this, your relationship will probably fall apart and Chris will be stuck with that failure for the next ten."

"Alain told me that he was separated," Chris says tonelessly, desperate to stop the impeding escalation. "He said he tried to start a business and failed, so he turned towards criminal activities. He told me he had to hide from the Orion syndicate Oanai Sqail. I found him a lawyer, he supposedly talked to the guy, I can give you the address. I think the separation was true, he looked quite sad at times. He's got two sons, couldn't see them." He stares down on his hands, folded on the table. "Part of me knew it was stupid, but I was fucking lonely. I’d never felt that lonely before." Looking up again he meets Dael's serene gaze, and she holds it. 

"Good," John says. "We know about the wife. Alain was indeed separated. I talked to her but she knew nothing about his activities of the last six months before his disappearance. The Orion connection is new, I'll see what I can find out about current activities of Oanai Sqail." 

In thoughts, Chris rubs his forehead. There's a memory lingering, one he doesn't really want to stir up but he knows it's important, and so he cautiously allows his mind to return to the night of Alain's… intervention. He must've zoned out over it, because next thing he knows is the doc's touch on his arm, concerned gazes resting at him when he looks up.

"Do you remember something else, Chris?" John asks. 

He shakes his head, the impulse to push the rising images back to the dark place where they belong sharp and overwhelming. Burying one hand in his hair, he struggles to find words.

"Chris…" The doc reaches out for him once more but Chris shakes his head.

"No thanks. I'll manage," he says roughly and sits up. "That night… Alain said he'd read my report." The memories unblur a little, enough to remember how he lay on the bed, how Alain crawled over him, his limbs sluggish and tied to the bench… no, bed…

If he really starts to think about it, he'll lose it. 

_No. Fucking. Way.  
_  
"About the Narada?" John asks, tearing him out of his inner struggle for control.

"Yes. I'm not completely sure, but I think Alain knew too much. Too many details, more than I put into my written report. Some of it could only be found in the interviews with the psychologists at SFM."

The doc frowns. "You mean Alain had read your confidential patient data?" 

"Extracts of transcripts probably, which someone had put together for optimal effect."

 _Ten easy ways to drive Christopher Pike crazy.  
_  
"Considering that everything in this conspiracy points towards an insider job, I'm not surprised," John says and puts down more notes. "Guess that's a job for you, doc."

Leonard nods. "There aren't too many people with the right authorization _and_ a good reason to access that data. I'll see whether I can find anything suspicious in the logs."

"How about your former doctor, Chris — Naaz Anumanchi?" John asks.

A little shocked, Chris replies, "I doubt that." 

"No fucking way," the doc says sharply. 

John notes the name down anyway. "We're looking for any people you interacted with that had access to sensitive information. I'll put anyone on the list again, now that we know that McAllister was a scapegoat as much as Alain."

Jim fiddles with his PADD. "I'll send Spock the information about the possible signature forgery. We'll throw some of the Enterprise resources at that one. Do you remember any other weapon where this might have happened?"

Chris helplessly raises his hands. "I'm sorry, I really can't remember. But the others should've taken place after the dredger."

"I checked Cho's timetable, she should be on Earth in a week. We could invite her to dinner, bet she'd love to see you again, Chris." Jim's gaze moves to Dael, but she stares at the table top, ignoring his attempt at making contact.

"The tech teams need to clean the apartment first," the doc says. "And all four of us need to get checked for after-effects in Starfleet General."

"You can stay here for the time being," John says. "Eric is currently off-planet, and I'll sleep in the office. You'll get the key code. Chris can show you where everything is, especially the bed. I'd rather get started now, while the trail is still fresh."

They accept the gracious offer and then everyone gets up, chatter filling the room, last details being discussed, time tables set.

In the end, it's Dael and Chris standing in the otherwise empty living room. They look at each other across the two meters they're apart, and he's the first to look away. 

"I know that an apology isn't good enough," he says flatly. "My actions were unforgivable and I —"

"Stop it," Dael says, lacing her arms in front of her. "It's good enough and it isn't." 

His stomach tenses into a painful ball. "Meaning what?"

"I understand what happened, and that it wasn't your fault. I still…" Now she looks away, eyes full of hurt. "I still can't have that another time. No matter why."

It's a bit unfair, but he understands. "I always said you should leave me if you can't live with me anymore," he says throatily.

"Do you want me to go?" she wonders, her eyes back on his face, searching his.

"Never," he says. "I don't know if I could go on living without you. But that shouldn't keep you here."

"Maybe one day, you wouldn't want to be with me anymore anyway." 

"Can't imagine it ever happening."

"Sometimes it feels as if… there's something inside of me, something dark, and when it wakes up, it will be horrible. I will be horrible." Gnawing her bottom lip, her eyes drift along the walls before getting back to him, her shoulder line showing her tension. 

"You know that this isn't really you, it's the effects of the generators. We haven't been ourselves for the last weeks, none of us."

She shrugs once more, her arms still like a shield around herself, not really buying his line.

He sighs. "I wouldn't be surprised if your therapy on Vulcan had dampened some memories, but I don't think there's anything monstrous hiding in you."

Stating his trust in her that plainly seems to do the trick; she relaxes a little, her body swaying forward like wanting to move and not yet ready to. 

Chris opens his arms. "Come here, darling. Please." It's a wager, and for the fraction of a second he thinks he's lost it — lost her — but then she hesitatingly puts one foot in front of the other until she's between his stretched-out arms. Only when she places her own arms around his waist does he close the embrace and pull her tight, pressing kisses all over her forehead and down to her lips at last. They kiss for a long time, as if they're unwilling to part ever again.

"I love you so much," he mutters against her spiky hair when they finally end it. "So very much."

She leans her face against his shoulder, tightening her hold on him. "I love you too. I want to give you strength and support — all the help that I got, I want to give to you, but I'm not as strong as they are, I'm only human and when you hit Jim, I just ran without thinking."

"I'm so sorry," he mutters and kisses her forehead again, right on the tattoos. How crazy that she apologizes for anything when she's been his guardian angel for so long. A shame he didn't make the best of the ground she'd prepared and the doc had built upon. 

A decision rises, unfolding powerfully. Unlacing from her, he looks into her eyes. "I need your help. I need you to contact someone."

A momentary frown shifts into deep relief as Dael understands what he's asking for. 

***

It's unbelievable how Chris' state improves, almost as if the knowledge alone that this hadn't been his personal weakness but yet another external influence could heal him. Things are sharp and in focus, almost as good as during the last days on the beach, and he feels he is coming alive again. The medical checkup is only half as bad as feared, and he comes out with a relatively clean bill of health (well, as _clean_ as he'd ever get).

He's still very sensitive regarding other persons and their opinion about him, prone to fear others would work against him. It has its base in reality, obviously, but for his upcoming quest, he needs to be able to judge reality from suppositions very soon. 

T'Sol, the Vulcan healer Dael connects him with at the Vulcan embassy, is young, otherworldly beautiful, and tells him outright that she'd never considered working with a male human as they can't control their sexual impulses, but she's making an exception for him. Leaving her with an appointment for the first, intense five day start of his therapy, Chris shakes an inward fist at the people who thought they could knock him out of the game. He'd be back faster than they'd ever supposed.

***

"So instead of keep seeing Ralph Kouchuroun, you'd rather get some strange therapy from some random Vulcan quack who's got no official licensing on Earth for any of the things she does?" Leonard says accusingly when he tells his lover of his plans. "Way to go, Chris."

At last back into their own apartment after two days of comfortable but still taxing exile in John's apartment, Chris sits on his favorite couch with one knee pulled up to his chest, arms laced around it, taking the criticisms that ramble on and letting them run through him.

"You done?" he asks coolly when the doc needs to take a breath, and unfolds to get up. "You wanted me to find a therapist. And I don't want another long, exhausting attempt at something that has been shown not to work in the past. I've got a job to do, and I've got to do it soon, before the _Enterprise_ is away and any possible suspicious weapon deals much harder to follow." He picks up his comm. "Here, give her a call."

The doc hesitates. _Of course_ , Chris thinks with a flash of anger. _All barking, little biting._ "Take it and call her, meet for a coffee or whatever. I prefer you to be okay with her because you're both my lover and my trusted physician, but in the end, it's me who's got to work with her."

The doc takes the communicator and vanishes. He reappears more than an hour later, when Chris is standing in the kitchen, watching Jim and Dael joking around while preparing salad. Sometimes, they're such kids.

"That's yours," Leonard mutters and shoves the comm at him.

"And, what's the verdict?" Chris asks quietly as he puts it away. 

"Looks like she's got some experience," the doc admits grudgingly. "Probably can't do much damage." 

"Considering what a hopeless case I am…"

"Bullshit," the doc says, and pulls him close. "Sorry if I ever gave you that impression. In my book, nobody's a hopeless case."

"So sweet," Chris mutters, then shuts up his lover by kissing him firmly, his hands slipping around Leonard's ass. Answering hands skim under his shirt, caressing his skin. Their groins draw together, sweet pressure building as they get lost in the moment. When they resurface, they're alone in the kitchen, a large bowl of salad ready on the table.

"Seems we scared them away," Chris says.

Leonard smiles. "I don't mind." He laces his hand around Chris' neck, pulling him into another long kiss. "Sorry for pushing you so hard."

"It's okay. I need it." Chris sighs. "Not quite that hard at times, maybe, but without you it would have taken me a lot longer to get away from the beach."

"Would you even have left at all?" Leonard's fingers nudge along his shoulder muscles. "You could have had a comfortable life with Dael."

"It wouldn't have been good for her," Chris states, and finds that right now he'd rather not talk about Dael. Running his fingers up the zipper of his lover's jeans, he opens it blindly to edge out the half-erect member.

"Oh…" Leonard chokes as he fists the length. 

Chris gets down on his knees and wets his lips before getting to serious business.

***

They deliver him to the embassy the next morning, which is so grey it might be interpreted as bad omen if Chris registered it, but he's giddy and excited and fucking determined that _this_ therapy _will_ work, goddammit. 

Of course the doc can't stop playing devil's advocate, pulling him aside on their short way from the parking lot to the tall gates. 

"I did some research about T'Sol last night. She belongs to the school of Sh'stolon — a group that's got a reputation for using some questionable methods to achieve their goals."

"The goals of their patients, you mean," Chris corrects him. "Considering my record of questionable things in my life, this sound fitting." He smiles.

"I just…" Leonard's voice breaks for a second, before he's able to carry on, "I just don't want to lose you again, not when you've come so far."

"I know." Taking the doc into an embrace, Chris hugs him tightly. "I'm doing the right thing. Trust me, please." He knows that Leonard doesn't like this Vulcan voodoo, not for Chris and not as a part of Dael's past, but being a good man, the doc swallows down any more concerns and pulls himself together. Jim claps him on the shoulder, hiding his own concerns behind an optimistic smile and his trademark statement about there being no no-win situations in life. Dael… she seems to be both the least concerned and the most agitated, curling into his final embrace with a burning intensity and whispering, "May they be able to do for you what they did for me". 

He nods, throat suddenly too tight to say anything, then turns around and a little too hastily walks through the opening gate, T'Sol already awaiting him on the path to the gardens. 


End file.
